President Obama consults Jeffrey Immelt at an Economic Recovery Advisory Board meeting

In 2008, Jeffrey Immelt (who is now President Obama’s jobs czar) was a director of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and was simultaneously the CEO of General Electric when GE received a massive bailout loan from the Fed.

According to the article at The Washington Examiner link above, the New York Fed “consulted with General Electric about creating an ‘emergency program to assist with the commercial paper market’ while Immelt served as a New York Fed director. . . .” A report from Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., states that the New York Federal Reserve later gave General Electric $16 billion in “emergency lending” financing while Immelt remained in place at both organizations.

In related news, President Obama signaled solidarity with the Occupy Wall Street protesters in an ABC News interview yesterday. The Occupy Wall Street group is protesting corporate corruption.

In the interview, Obama said, “The most important thing we can do right now is those of us in leadership letting people know that we understand their struggles and we are on their side, and that we want to set up a system in which hard work, responsibility, doing what you’re supposed to do, is rewarded, and that people who are irresponsible, who are reckless, who don’t feel a sense of obligation to their communities and their companies and their workers that those folks aren’t rewarded.”

The President’s Jobs Czar and top level economic recovery adviser received $5.6 million as compensation for his role at GE in 2009, and $15.2 million last year according to this source. Speaking at a ThomsonReuters event in New York yesterday, Immelt said, “I think we have to be empathetic” with Americans who are out of work.

General Electric paid no corporate income taxes in 2010.